Advances in Materials Science and Engineering: An International Journal (MSEJ), Vol. 3, No.

3, September 2016

NEW EXPERIMENT SYSTEM FOR THE

INTERACTION BETWEEN SOFT ROCK AND
WATER: A CASE STUDY ON THE MOGAO
GROTTOES SUPPORT ROCK
Zhu Guolong*, Qin Xinzhan, Hao Nai and Zhang Fang
China University of Mining and Technology, Beijing, P. R. China

ABSTRACT
The strength of rock strongly depends on the water content especially when the rocks contain clay
materials. The interaction between soft rock and water always threaten the soft rock engineering projects.
For this problem, new sets of laboratory experiment systems are developed to simulate the interaction
between soft rock and water or vapor. In this paper, the principles of experiment systems are introduced
with particular reference to the application on soft rock in Mogao Grottoes, one of the world famous
ancient sites in China. Two kinds of rock samples, the sandstone and muddy sandstone, are obtained by insitu sampling system. Then the laboratory experiments are performed under different environment
conditions. By the specific boundary conditions design, the physical-chemical effect and mechanic effect on
water absorption of rock samples are separated for further mechanism study by the experiment system, and
the different hydrological actions of water and vapor under variable experiment environment are obtained.
The interaction mechanism is discussed with assistant methods, such as SEM (Scanning Electron
Microscope), mercury injection test, X-ray diffraction analysis and etc. With the relation between water
content and soft rock strength, the study may provide guidance and basis for the soft rock engineering in
the future.

1. INTRODUCTION
Soft Rocks always present undesirable behaviors, such as low strength, disaggregation, crumbling,
high plasticity, slaking, fast weathering and many other characteristics.[1] Previous study shows
that the strength of rock strongly depends on the water content especially when the rocks contain
clay materials. The interaction between soft rock and water always threaten the soft rock
engineering projects. Taking the Mogao Caves site in Dunhuang, China, as an example, this
culture relics is one of the largest stone caves temples in China. It is located in the Duanming
Moutain and the extensive studies on common issues and challenges in classification, mechanism,
assessment, protection and repair of Mogao Caves have been carried out. But the soft surrounding
rocks and the paintings support rocks are suffering serious. Researches on soft rock culture relics
protection and preservation, represented by the Mogao Caves , play significant roles in retaining
the precious of remarkable ancient China, therefore it is of a great significance to achieve
effective protection and long-term preservation to cultural relics [2].
At present, there are less focus on the risks associated to the rock failure. Some researchers put
efforts on earthquake risk analysis to the Dunhuang site which can cause damages to the support
rock of the caves and unrepairable disasters to cultural relics can happen [3,4]. Other sources like
physical damage, salinization, and weathering of support can also bring disastrous damage [5,6].
In-situ tests fit conditions of rare cultural relics, but they should be performed in order to avoid
DOI:10.5121/msej.2016.3303

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Advances in Materials Science and Engineering: An International Journal (MSEJ), Vol. 3, No. 3, September 2016

risks to the relics, however non destructive tests are always a better option. Therefore, laboratory
tests should be employed. The main factors, such as temperature, humidity, freezing, melting
weathering and salination damage, were studied by predecessors, and the influence of water is a
common key issue for the cultural relics protection. Difficulties lays in in-situ sampling,
laboratory testing method, and corresponding experiment systems development are still obvious,
forming an urgent need for new ideas, technology and experimental equipments developments.
GDUE (State Key Laboratory for Geomechanics and Deep Underground Engineering from China
University of Mining and Technology, Beijing) performs long-term researches on soft rock, clay
minerals, failure mechanism, geotechnical laboratory testing, and real-time remote monitoring
and control techniques, with remarkable achievements. In this study, combined with the
experience of GDUE, researches on Mogao caves rock weathering at different levels were
proposed under coupled multi-field environment. A self-developed sampling system was used for
field sampling, and then the samples were used in new laboratory equipments [7-11].
In this paper, new sets of laboratory experiment systems are developed to simulate the interaction
between soft rock and water or vapor. The principles of experiment systems are introduced with
particular reference to the application on soft rock weathering in Mogao Grottoes, and the in-situ
environment conditions, the atmospheric humidity influenced by the weather and the local
environment in the caves influenced by outside were considered. A new laboratory experiment
system was developed to simulate the coupled temperature and humidity environment for the
surrounding rock and support of wall paintings. The main technical parameters of the system was
tested, proving that it can realize long time constant temperature and humidity control, and can be
applied to the weathering mechanism study on Mogao Caves stones. It indicates that the
microstructure and the basic mechanical properties of the situ samples have changed at different
environment conditions. For further research, SEM (Scanning Electron Microscope), mercury
injection test, X-ray diffraction analysis were also performed. Sample composition,
microstructure and properties were studied from the microscopic view. From the mesoscopic
view, the physical parameters and mechanical properties of samples were studied. Finally
analysis are performed on macro-failure mechanism based on above, expecting to provide new
theoretical support for the protection and preservation of cultural relics sites.

2. EXPERIMENT SYSTEMS
The soft rock absorption mechanism is complicated for the combination of physical absorption by
capillary and structure effects, the mechanical absorption by the water head or pressure and the
chemical effect by clay minerals and other materials. For this problem, the first water absorption
system in GDUE was improved and upgraded in 2015, and the water vapor absorption system
was designed and developed. The different mechanism of water absorption can be studied
seperately.

2.1 Water absorption system

Two kinds of water absorption (WA) experiment are designed as the following diagrams. Figure
1a shows the WA experiment without water head pressure, the connection between the soft pipe
and measuring glass were set at the same level to separate mechanical effect. Then, the
experiment in Figure 1b considered the physical, chemical and mechanical effects. The WA value
was acquired by the monitoring system automatically and draw the curve in the computer. With
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Advances in Materials Science and Engineering: An International Journal (MSEJ), Vol. 3, No. 3, September 2016

the combinition of the above two experiments, the mechanical effect in the soft rock water
absorption was evaluated.

Fig.1 Mechanism of Soft Rock Water Absorption Experiment System: a, experiment without water
head pressure; b, experiment with water head pressure.

2.2 Water Vapor absorption system

A new set of experiment system for soft rock gas absorption (SRGA) was lately developped in
GDUE. For the complex field conditions related to geotechnical projects, such as underground
excavating, cultural relic preservation and etc., the SRGA system was developed to measure the
water vapor sorption of soft rock samples. The system permits also the absorption of various
gases, such as vapor, carbon dioxide (CO2), Nitrogen (N2) and even methane (CH4).
SRGA system can realize long time constant temperature, humidity and gas content control
during the testing process as shown in Fig. 2. The SRGA testing system consists of the main body
with two test chambers with gas supply station, control panel and a computer for automatic data
acceptance and curve plotting. Test chamber 1# is for gases mixing, the temperature, humidity
and gas contents in the chamber reach set values before transferred to test chamber 2# where the
samples with a maximum number of six are laid. The channels between two test chambers only
open for a set period to make both test chambers reaching testing conditions, and after that the
channels are closed and the test chamber 2# can perform the gas absorption test in a constant and
undisturbed environment.
The value of environment temperature, humidity and different gases content can be set on the
control panel before the test started, or change during the test processing if necessary. All the
monitored environment parameters in test chamber are transferred to a computer, with the
application of a software, the environment parameters and gases absorption of samples are
collected and plotting automatically. Besides, all the data from the test is saved in a database file
for further processing.
The technical parameters indexes are listed in Table 1. The range of temperature is from -20 to
70C which covers the natural climate variations, and the adjustable relative humidity range from
30 to 100%. SRGA system can be set at a constant index to simulate specific environment
parameters for the weathering mechanism research. The amplitude of parameters variation is
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controlled, for temperature is 1C, gas content 2 %, and relative humidity 4%. To make the
system more effective and reduce the period of reaching designed environment, the speed of
temperature rise and down in test chamber 1# is controlled, while the test chamber 2# operates
smoothly for an undisturbed filed environment simulation.

Fig.2 Composition of SRGA Experiment System

Table 1 Main Technical Parameters of SRGA System

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3. CASE ON MOGAO GROTTOES SUPPORT ROCK

3.1 Background
Mogao Caves are located at Gansu Province, Northwest China. From 4 A.D. century, the Caves
started to be constructed along the east sedimentary strata precipice of Mingsha Mountain more
than 1,600 meters from North to South. Previous study shows the damp environment and water
effect are recognized as main factors threatening the pigment ground and plaster layers, support
and surrounding rock [12-16]. Water is not only a direct and indirect cause of various damages,
but also the vehicle for salt efflorescent in salination and weathering [17-20].
Field sense detection was widely used in the preservation environment of human heritages for
water source analysis. Monitoring of major external environment parameters in Mogao caves
were performed, such as temperature, humidity, and illumination [21-24]. In the field, two
boreholes with seven detectors at different depth were drilled for rock mass characterization[25].
Acquired data of temperature and humidity were obtained for three years from 2008, and the
seasonal rules of monitored parameters were summarized. The study found that temperature
gradually decreases from shallow to deep, and temperature fluctuations trend to disappear after
reach a certain depth around 2.5 m from the surface.
Samples for cultural relic preservation research can be divided into three kinds: natural, remolded
and manmade samples. Natural samples are rare and remolded ones need natural material, while
the manmade samples are based on the clear composition and ingredients of exact materials or
simplification. Common indoor experiments and methods include the dry-wet cycle test, freezing
and thawing cycle test, wind tunnel simulation test, water absorption test and water vapor
absorption test etc. Despite numbers of studies have been carried out to study rockwater
interaction, the experiments to seperate the mechanical effect of water absorption and the water
vapor studies are limited. The interaction between water and cultural relics need more efforts in
testing conditions control and data acquitting [26-32].

3.2 Sampling
Field sampling was performed with the support of Dunhuang Academy. Large numbers of
samples are needed when carrying out experimental studies and are the best choice to ensure the
accuracy, reliability and scientific of the results of the experiments. A set of undisturbed samples
was employed. The sampling system, as shown in Fig. 3, includes a sampling rig, which can fix at
any direction for sampling and the diameter of drilling tool is 50 60mm (Fig. 3a), a portable
sample cutter (Fig. 3b) and portable sample box (Fig. 3c). After cutting has been completed, the
standard sample is sealed with wax to ensure the undisturbed nature of samples.

Fig.3 Undisturbed samples sampling system.

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Sampling was performed along the end of Mogao Caves precipice (Fig. 4a), and two types of
rock, muddy sandstone and sandstone, were obtained as shown in Fig. 4b. Samples were
processed to 55110 mm cylindrical cores in the field, using rock drilling, portable cutting tools.
To keep the in-situ condition of the samples, the cylindrical cores were cut and sealed before
being transported to the laboratory.

Fig.4 a, An Overview of Mogao Grottoes, (1) and (3) the sampling position,
(2) the Nine floors temple and Buddha; b, In-situ cut and sealed muddy sandstone samples; c, sealed
sandstone samples.

3.3 WA Tests
Water absorption tests were performed on the muddy sandstone and sandstone samples separately.
Firstly, the WA tests without water head pressure on muddy sandstone obtained the curves for the
water absorption. As the mechanical test results showed, the UCS of this type of rock samples
was lower than 1 MPa. During the WA tests, disaggregation were unavoidable, the water
absorption processes were recorded before the disaggregation.
Figure 5 showed the curves of sample water content (w = mWA/msample *100%) versus time, the
critical WA value for muddy sandstone samples disaggregation was around 40%.

Figure 5. WA curves of muddy sandstone samples

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The photograph of MS samples after tests were shown in Figure 6. WA pressure tests were failed
to perform on these samples because of the easy broken peculiarity.
WA tests were performed on the sandstone samples. The curves of WA tests with pressure was
shown in Figure 7, and the water content (w) of sandstone was significantly lower than the
muddy sandstone, but this type of rock still had large water absorb ability comparing to general
hard rocks that performed in the laboratory before.
Figure 8 showed the WA tests without water head pressure and samples need more time to reach
the equivalent value in the WA tests with pressure. The water absorption processes of soft rock
would be the basis and support for the research on its engineering mechanical behaviors such as
soften, weathering and salt movement and accumulation.

MS-1

MS-2

MS-3

Figure 6. Muddy sandstone samples after WA tests without water head pressure

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3.4 SRGA Tests

For the SRGA tests design, several of parameters combinations are employed and the PH value is
set at 7 by using pure water at first stage, which is listed in Table 2.

The vapor absorption curves are obtained in each group of tests, as showing in Figure 5. Fig. 5a
shows the first coupled environment by setting the temperature at 30C and relative humidity
95%. The constant environment in test chamber 2# was reached after 20 hours from the test start.
The unstable changing of environment humidity for the first stage brings obvious influence on the
absorption rate. Curves became smooth in the constant stage of the test.
To avoid the effect produced by the adjustment stage of environment parameters, the control of
system was optimized and we delayed the occasion to place test samples in test chamber 2#. Fig.
5b shows a designed environment with lower relative humidity. The impulse of humidity was
later found caused by the humidifier. Figs. 5c and 5d show the other two of the tests, and the
absorption ability of muddy sandstone is much larger than that of sandstone.

Figure 9. Monitored Environment Parameters and Absorption Curves

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Some of typical photographs of samples before and after experiment are displayed in Figure 10.
The muddy sandstone has a larger vapor absorption rate and loose weight rapidly, forming
surface damages. And the strength is reduced sharply; the sample N10-1 in Figure 6a was
cracking when we try to move it out from test chamber 2#, which is the same as the
macroscopical flaking, exfoliation and many other damages on Mogao Caves. The sandstones
showing in Fig. 10b had little changes from observation.

Figure 10. Typical Samples Before and After Tests

3.5 Additional tests

(1) X-ray diffraction
X-ray diffraction experiments were employed in the mineral analysis of Mogao Caves rocks. The
mineral composite of muddy sandstone and sandstone is listed in Table 3. The content of quartz
and feldspar in both type of rock is similar, but the muddy sandstone is rich in calcite from
sedimentation. The content of clay mineral in both types is high, with 17.2 and 29.7%. For a
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further study, the relative content of clay minerals is considered, and two types of rock show
fairly good consistency.
Table 3 Mineral Type and Content of Dunhuang Mogao Samples

(2) SEM Test

SEM experiments were used for the microstructure analysis of Mogao samples. According to the
SEM experiment results analysis of selected samples, the clay minerals are in the form of
conglomerate in both muddy-sandstone and sandstone in Mogao Caves (see Figure 11and 12), but
the difference laying in the microstructure between muddy-sandstone and sandstone is obvious
that the former has a larger surface porosity factor. Besides, the connection of large and small
pore or micro cracks leads to joint development, which makes water or vapor even faster
transmission, and further softening, disintegration and swell, and finally sharply reduce the
strength of rock [32-34].
The vapor absorption of Dunhuang Mogao support is mainly influenced by the environment
temperature, humidity, microstructure and clay minerals. Based on the laboratory tests and
additional tests test results, the clay mineral content in sandstone is about 30% and larger than
muddy sandstone, but the vapor absorption ability is lower. The primary effect factor of vapor
absorption between different types of support rock in Mogao Caves is the microstructure [35-37].
The SEM experiment results show that the clay mineral expand after water absorption in both
muddy sandstone and sandstone samples. Both the material is unconsolidated and porous from
the view of photographs magnified 1,200 times, but the compactness of sandstone is comparable
larger with few pores or discontinuity when magnified 5,000 times.

Figure 11. SEM Results of sandstones

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Figure 12. SEM Results of Muddy Sandstones

(3) Rock Soften

Water absorption can cause soft rock softening, and the strength of soft rock is reducing with the
increase of water content [33, 34]. Mechanical tests were performed on sandstone samples with
different water content by WA tests. When taken out from the chamber of WA system, the rock
samples were immediately set on the UCS test system, as showing in Figure 13.

Figure 13. UCS Tests on Rock Samples with different water content

The stress-strain curves were shown in Figure 14. The FS0 was put into the drying system for 24
hours, and the mass of sample changed little from the natural sample because the weather in
Dunhuang, located in the northwesten China, was normally dry
.

Figure 14. Stress-strain curves on sandstone samples with different water content

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The natural strength of the sandstone was obtained as about 19.2 MPa. Samples FS5 to FS10
were in the WA tests as introduced in the last section and then in the UCS tests. Results showed
that the UCS decresed rapidly when the water content increased. When the sandstone exposed to
water for 100 hours, see curve of FS8 in the figures, the strength reduced to 40% of the natural
one, which could cause serious damage and geological disasters in the field.

CONCLUSIONS
Soft rocks always present undesirable behaviors and cause many engineering problems and one
of the significant effect factors is the water. For the study on the interaction between water and
soft rocks, two series of laboratory experiment systems were developed in the GDUE, China.
Testing of the systems and experiment methords were introduced discussed through an
engineering project on Dunhuang Mogao support rock weathering effected by water.
Decades of work in the protection and preservation of cultural relics, represented by Mogao
Caves, provided solid foundations on theory and mechanisms related to the knowledge of the
rock mass environment. However, the knowledge of Mogao Cvaes surrounding rocks, the muddy
sandstone and sandstone, and water interactions remains insufficient, particularly in water vapor
effect.
Field sampling was performed in Dunhuang Mogao, and the same type of rock samples as Mogao
Grottoes support rock are obtained. The WA tests and SRGA tests for water vapor absorption
were performed on these samples by the developed experiment systems. The absorption processes
could be recorded and the disaggregation, salt transprotion, surface weathering and softening
process of soft rocks were reproduced in the laboratory.
For the further understanding the interaction and mechanisms, additional tests were employed for
a better knowledge of basic information of mineral content and microstructure of different types
of rock. The presented results show that the the clay mineral content in sandstone is about 30%
and larger than muddy sandstone, and the microstructure is one of the primary effect factors for
Dunhuang support rocks.
For muddy sandstone, water can easily cause the material disaggregation, and the factors of
temperature and relative humidity are involved, and dynamic change of vapor sorption of
conglomerate rock generally followed an exponential law. For sandstone, the UCS decresed
rapidly with the increased of sample water content. Long time exposion to water can cause the
strength reduced to 40% of the natural rock, which could be serious risks in the field preservation
of cultural relics.
Besides, the studies related to water sorption influencing parameters and vapor-induced strength
weakening and microstructure changes are critical for improved understanding of rock
preservation in Mogao Caves. But there are still more laboratory tests with chemical and
mechanical analysis, numerical simulations on microstructure studies should be performed for a
better guidance for cultural relics protection and preservation.

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Financial supports of this study was provided by the National Natural Science Foundation of
China (51134005), and by the Major Projects of Science and Technology in Gansu province,
China (1102FKDF014).

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